The Trouble of Time: A Sequel
by TheGirlWhoWoreNeon
Summary: Haley thought her time traveling days were over. But one year later, she faces more complications than ever in the post-rebellion world. A new villain suddenly emerges and threatens more than just her life. Now it will be up to Katniss, Peeta, Gale, and many more to train her so she can defeat what every person in Panem fears. If that isn't enough, she also has a friend to protect.
1. Chapter 1

**Please read: This story is a sequel to "What's Built In The Basement Doesn't Stay In The Basement". Without reading the original, the following story will make no sense, and most likely spoil some events of the first one.**

**At last! After contemplating title after title for this story, I finally found one :D It's a spin off of a C.S. Lewis book called ****_The Problem of Pain_****. Enjoy!**

**Disclaimer(s): I do not own any part of The Hunger Games (it belongs to Suzanne Collins and all of those publisher people). I ALSO do not own The Problem of Pain (it belongs to C.S. Lewis and all of those other publisher people). One was written by a lady who likes to channel surf, and the other was written by a mythology-lover**

* * *

I sighed and tossed my English textbook onto the desk in my room. I'm pretty sure that if you were to make a list of the world's most evil people in history, 10th grade English teachers would be somewhere on that list.

Of course, English had never been a gift of mine…

That was me; Haley Green, 16 years old. It had been about a year before that when I had traveled two hundred years into the future. No one ever thought that there would be an actual Hunger Games, but I knew that there was.

It took me quite a while to calm down about the whole thing after I got back. I was going crazy trying to meet up with Suzanne Collins and ask her how she knew about it. I tried everything I possibly could to prevent the future from happening, but as far as I knew, nothing had succeeded yet.

I still hadn't told a single person about what had actually happened in the future. As far as all of my friends knew, it wasn't pretty- but they had no idea that it was something as terrible as The Hunger Games.

My cell phone rang from inside my tote bag, and I picked it up to see that it was my friend Josh. He wasn't necessarily happy that I hadn't told him where I'd been in the future, but nothing can really tear apart two friends that worked on a time machine together.

"Hey, Josh," I said, holding the cell phone up to my ear with one hand and flipping open the English textbook with the other. "What's up?"

"I was wondering if you wanted to catch a movie later," he said. "My brother just got home from college, and I really don't want to be around while my parents ask questions about if I'm going or not."

I smiled. "Wow, your life is so complicated."

"You know it."

"Alright. But if I fail my English test tomorrow because I was studying quickly to go to a movie, it's your fault." I held the phone with my cheek and my shoulder as I sharpened my pencil.

Josh laughed. "Somehow I knew that was coming. It's always my fault, isn't it?"

"Always."

"Alright," he said, "Meet me there at five."

I hung up and set my phone down on the desk. Before my time traveling trip, I took phones for granted. Sure, I knew that Katniss only had one in her Victor's Village house, but her situation seemed much more…. Fictional, before then.

Although I had much more to do now than work on or think about a time machine and the trip I'd taken with it, it was still always on my mind. I'd talked to Finnick Odair. He saved me from death on more than one occasion. I even still had a scrap of his shirt.

I only had one question now- if I were to go back to that exact same time and place as I had before (which would now only be 199 years into the future), would he still remember me? Think about it. If I took the scrap of his shirt back, would the time machine somehow make it vanish, since he wouldn't have ripped the shirt yet? My mind always hurt when I thought so hard.

My mind kept on wandering and wandering, causing me to be so frustrated that I put my hands over my ears as if it would block out my thoughts, and stared at the textbook that's lessons were foreign to me at the current time. It's impossible to say how much I wished that I had never taken that trip into the future. Even still having the machine in our house was a haunting memory to me. The important thing was that I would never ever go back.

Fifteen more minutes went by, and I still couldn't focus. Instead of slamming my book shut, I took a deep breath, smoothed down my hair which I had been twirling relentlessly, and calmly closed it. I needed to start walking in the direction of the theater if I was going to make it there by five o'clock.

I put a sky blue scarf around my neck on that chilly November afternoon. I slipped on some simple black gloves and told my parents that I'd be back by eight. Then, I headed off.

I wouldn't have had to walk everywhere if I'd have learned how to drive. But in all honesty, driving terrified me. I'm also hopeless when it comes to directions, and where certain streets are, and- well, the list goes on. But really, when you live in a town where you can walk to anything, what's the point of spending money on gas?

I reached the theater just in time. Josh stood inside the door with his hands in his pockets, as usual.

When I went over to him, he looked at his watch and shook his head. "Always on time." I was usually no more than two minutes late to anything, but Josh had adopted this phrase after my time traveling. And just like that, he thought he was so cool because he could play around with words.

* * *

Throughout the entire movie I lacked concentration. My mind kept going off into some Hunger Games trance, and before I knew, the credits were rolling.

Josh waited until we were outside the theater to talk to me. "So, I couldn't help but notice that you weren't paying attention in there?"

I sighed. "You're quite correct."

"You know, you've changed, Haley," he said.

"How have I changed?" I asked. "Is it in a bad way?"

"Not really." We began walking in the direction of my house. Josh continued, "You used to be this crazy freshman who practically hated her life in this time. When you got back…. You were different. You're way more mature."

"What I saw in the future was very maturing, Josh," I replied, looking down as I walked beside him.

"I don't understand why you don't tell anybody about it. I mean, if it was all that bad, why would people want to go?"

I didn't answer. Honestly, what do you think will stop a crazy fan from going into the future to meet their favorite book character? If I had still been as foolish as I was, _I _would probably want to. But in a free country, the mind can't even fathom what it's like to be held so captive.

"Well, can you at least tell me how you got the machine to work?" he said. "I've always wondered how it didn't work when I was there, but did when you were alone."

I thought out my words carefully, as to not give anything away. "The machine only knew what time I'd selected- it didn't know where I wanted to go. So, I kind of told it where to go…. By accident."

"How? Did you give it some sort of destination feature without me knowing?"

"No. Apparently, it can analyze anything that's on it. I had…." I paused, wondering if I should even tell him. "I had a book with me."

"You went into a book?" Josh said with amazement. "Were you holding some kind of Star Wars book adaption?"

I sighed in frustration. "See, that's exactly why I can't tell you. Just the idea of going into a book is tempting. But if you would have been there, you would know that it's not something you want to do."

"I honestly don't get what was so bad about the whole thing," he said. "If it was as absolutely terrible as you've been saying, then shouldn't you be trying to stop it?"

"I've tried, Josh! But I'm not exactly sure if I can change the future, if you know what I'm saying."

There was silence. I wanted more than anything in the world to tell him why he couldn't go into the future… But I just couldn't bring myself to say it. Between his knowledge of science and the amount of time he spent watching me work on the machine, I'd say he had a definite possibility of trying something he shouldn't.

Suddenly, he spoke up. "Did you ever consider the possibility that you might be a part of the future?" His voice was much calmer than before.

"What do you mean by that?" I asked.

"What if you are supposed to be an actual person in the year that you traveled to? I mean, what if your time trip was no ordinary plot interruption, but a way to get you to where you belong?"

"That sounds pretty unreal to me," I said.

Josh shrugged. "I guess you're right. It was just a thought."

* * *

**Ok, it will get to the Hunger Games part very soon- I promise :D How did you like the first chapter? Does Haley seem more mature to you?**


	2. Chapter 2

**I have a billion reasons I didn't update sooner. But, it's finally here :D**

* * *

Two days later, Josh came over to my house to help me with my English homework (we'd created this weekly get-together after I'd come back from the future). And boy, I sure needed it. Out of the six tests I'd taken so far, I passed two of them. Yes, two.

The only problem about having Josh as a friend was that everyone assumed we were romantically linked. We had quite a few classes together, we sat by each other at lunch, and he came to my house at least once every week. I say that's all because of scheduling coincidences, the fact that we both talk about the same things and thus find each other more interesting than everyone else, and because I'm a nearly hopeless English student, while he takes advanced classes. All of the girls laughed when we walked by together, and Finnick even asked me if Josh was my love interest.

Of course, it could be jealousy that led to all of the rumors. Josh was one of the most attractive boys in our school, and the female gender obviously feels more sentimental when around attractive males. He has short blonde hair, and his eyes are a very unnatural dark blue. He is quite tall as well- probably as tall as Finnick was when I saw him. Strength is also something to be noted in him. Really, he wasn't a bad-looking guy overall. I just couldn't picture myself with my best friend.

While we were in my basement and going over pointless specifications of verbs, his phone rang. He saw the number and looked apologetically at me. "Can I take this real quick?"

"No, but you can take it _really quickly_," I said, mocking him.

He smirked. "Alright then." He went up the stairs and I was left alone with nothing but thoughts and textbooks.

I sighed and fingered the recycled paper that my English guide was made of. I'm sure people in Panem never had to extensively study verbs. Maybe they were actually spared of certain horrors such as verb usage, advanced sentence diagramming, and other things in the realms of English language.

I always wondered what district Suzanne Collins would have been from. She looked much too normal to be from the Capitol, and also didn't have the crazy accent. I reviewed the districts and their industries in my head. After I'd gotten back from the Hunger Games, I Googled every possible fact there was to know about it. You know, just in case President Snow ever showed up in my house, seeking his revenge because I ruined his precious 65th Hunger Games.

As you can probably tell, my mind is so very complex.

So, would Suzanne Collins be from District 7? It was the only logical one I could think of, because she was a writer and books are made of paper….. Ok, scratch that. Let's just say that she was from the Capitol, because she was one of those who obviously didn't experience the trauma of the Games and instead put them down in exact words, shamelessly revisiting the deaths.

I looked at the time on my phone. I'd been so lost in my post-apocalyptic thoughts that I hadn't considered that Josh had been upstairs for quite a while. Maybe it was his mom that had called him- she was always staying updated as to his whereabouts and would usually give him an extremely long list of things she needed from the grocery store because she was too busy blogging for a living. Yeah, you read that correctly. _Blogging _for a living. I was grateful to live in a free country with no fight to the death, but really, some people just get off so easily.

I heard a loud thud from above me. What was going on? Had my sister suddenly decided that she needed to jump rope inside? Had my dad's office safe fallen over? Suddenly, an image came back to me. Josh had brought a backpack to my house and left it by our front door. He never used a backpack for anything outside of school, and he came over a significant amount of time after the bell rang for the day. So what exactly did he have in the backpack?

Suspense suddenly entered my mind and consumed every thought. I stood slowly and headed toward the stairs. My hands began to grow cold, as if my senses knew what was happening before I did. The further away from the basement I got, the more my mind raced and shouted to turn around. I felt as if there could only be one explanation.

I reached our front hallway and discovered that the dark green backpack was no longer sitting by the door.

My feet picked up speed now, and I almost ran into my dad, who had his reading glasses on and held a thick stack of papers.

"Whoa, what's the hurry for, Haley?" He asked.

"Sorry dad!" I said, not even stopping. I had but one purpose.

I reached the hallway with the pull-down ladder and tried to control my shaking hand so I could grab the rope. As soon as the ladder hit the ground (or maybe even before that) I was grabbing the rungs and shoving myself upward.

I immediately looked to the corner where the time machine sat. But, as if I was in an inescapable nightmare, the machine was completely gone.

I could hardly restrain all of the emotions that were stirring inside of me and threatened to boil over. I closed the exit then sat down on the cold attic floor. Josh's backpack, the machine, and Josh himself… Had all vanished.

Fear. Anger. Regret. Hopelessness. All of these flooded into me and made me completely unreachable. I stared at the dent in the floor that the machine had made because of its weight.

That was when tears filled my eyes and rolled down onto my cheeks. I buried my face in my cold hands.

All of this was my fault. I never should have told him that I went into a book. Now he would be in some part of time for as long as he wanted, and he didn't even consider what this might do to his family. They wouldn't let him out of the house for years.

If he even did come back…

I assumed that the best thing I could do was tell my parents about it right now. I didn't want to deal with the shock of this by myself, and they would know just what to do. I put my hand on the exit door, but then felt an icy breeze hit me. I let go of the handle in surprise and looked over to where the time machine had been. Only now, it was back. Josh had an unexplainable look on his face.

"Josh!" I exclaimed, rushing over to the machine. "I can't believe you did that!"

His expression changed to happy. His smile usually made me feel great inside, but right now, I almost wanted to slap him. "I don't know what you're so worried about, Haley," he said, stepping off of the machine. He held up my dad's old book adaption of a Star Wars movie. "That was the best time of my life!"

"Yeah, well Star Wars is quite a bit better than where I was," I said coldly. "How could you do that? How could you go off into some sci-fi land instead of treasuring your own life here? Were you even thinking about your family? About your friends? About me?"

"That's rich coming from you," he shot back.

My face felt hot, and I tore the book out of his hands. "You obviously didn't learn your lesson, like I did!"

"Haley, you know that you're my best friend. I would never leave all that I have here forever," Josh assured me. "I knew that I was coming back."

"I thought I was coming back too. But you never know what will happen there. And if it weren't for Finnick, I would still be there."

I realized what I'd said and covered my mouth. Josh looked surprised as well.

"You went into the Hunger Games?" He asked. He turned around and walked to the bookshelf that held all of my old science fiction books. But on that shelf was my original copy of the Hunger Games book. I'd bought a new copy a few months after my return, since this one was slightly unreadable from water damage.

Josh picked up the tattered work of literature and flipped through the washed-out pages. As he did, I hit the already abused time machine. I was frustrated at myself for working on it, but I was also extremely mad at the machine itself. I stepped onto it and pointlessly spun the time destination dial around and around while Josh marveled at what I'd just told him. I really should have been more careful, considering that messing with the machine was what made me time travel before.

"You could have told me this before, Haley," he said, closing the book.

"I couldn't be sure if you would want to go or not," I replied.

"Of course I wouldn't. I'm smarter than I look, you know."

I looked up from the time destination dial. "And yet you still left."

"I only did that because of the suspense. If you would have told me the truth sooner, I would have believed you and moved on with my life. But you wouldn't say anything, so I had to check it out for myself."

"Then why in the world did you go into Star Wars?"

"I assumed that's where you went. You were quite the sci-fi nerd," he said.

"True, but you were the sci-fi nerd's assistant." Our verbal battle was gaining tension at this point.

"So, you have no desire whatsoever to go back to The Hunger Games?" He asked.

"To be honest, I miss Finnick every day," I admitted. "And sometimes even Canton. His interrupting was a little much, but he was still decent."

"Who's Canton?"

"Oh, well, I sort of formed an alliance with him."

"Wait…." Josh looked very confused. And it's a strange thing to see a smart person confused. "What Hunger Games were you in?"

"Finnick's first one. It was the 65th."

"So…. Finnick and Canton both won?"

"No," I said. "When I first went to the arena, I stayed with Canton for a while. Then Finnick killed him. He was about to kill me too, but he knew that I wasn't a tribute. Somehow I convinced him to take me back to the time machine. He fixed it, and then killed the last boy."

"Alright," he said. "So, I'm guessing you're going to totally disown me now that I took the time machine?"

"Of course not. But I am going to completely destroy this thing once and for all."

Josh began walking back toward me. "Maybe you could just leave it for a little while. I mean, you could probably land yourself a spot in a history book if the word got out that you traveled into the future."

The sight of him made my voice rise to a dangerous level. "Josh! Stop!"

But it was too late. He stepped onto the machine and we were instantly thrown back against the seat. The Hunger Games book was still in his hand.

* * *

**The next chapter begins the adventures in The Hunger Games :)**


	3. Chapter 3

**So, you may have noticed that I slightly changed the description :)**

* * *

While we flew through time, I regretted once again that I had randomly twisted the dial. What time were we going to? I couldn't even open my eyes very much because of the wind hitting me brutally in the face. Whatever happened, I hoped that we weren't somehow going to be launched into the Capitol during the rebellion.

Since I'd hit my head on the handlebar before, I used my legs to brace myself against the seat. It was a good thing I did, because as soon as I was locked in place, the machine stopped. Josh was obviously smarter than I had been, because he had his hands out in front of him and only hit the bar with his palms.

I immediately powered the machine off and looked at the time destination dial. We'd gone 236 years into the future. Let's see, that would be approximately 26 years after the rebellion… This would be about the time that Katniss and Peeta had children with ages that were low in the double-digits. Finnick was long gone. But what about Annie? Suzanne Collins never said much about what happened to her. She had a baby after Finnick died. But did she go back to District 4? Or did she need assistance because she had mental issues?

And then there was always that question in the back of my mind. It tugged at me and interfered with my thoughts every once in a while. Had my presence in the 65th Games changed the plot line? Was Finnick alive long enough after his Games for Annie to even have a son?

Either way, I didn't want to find out. I set the time to 236 years in the past. But before I pulled the lever, Josh stopped me by grabbing my hand.

"Wait, you mean you're not going to see what has changed around here?" He said, surprised. "The rebellion would be over by now."

"Curiosity was a part of the idea that stranded me here in the first place. Now hang on, because we're going back."

I sat down and reached from my seat to pull the lever. But when I did, absolutely nothing happened. It was like déjà vu; I was trying to start the machine while a slightly skeptical Josh watched me.

I stood up quickly and made sure everything was working. The power was on, the time was selected, and the orange lever was down, as it was supposed to be. I looked back to make sure that Josh still had the book- he did.

"What's the problem?" He asked.

"The only logical explanation I can think of would be that the machine is overheated." I pushed the lever up and shut the whole thing down. "You took it on a trip and forgot to turn it off. Then we brought it here. It should be working again in a few minutes." I sat back down on the seat and stared at the panel of functions before me.

"So… Do you want to look around?" He suggested.

"You're kidding, right? When you're wandering around Panem, you don't even have to wait for something bad to happen. Things just go wrong all the time."

"You were in an arena. And the rebellion is over now. It has to be safe."

I looked around for the first time. The ground was made of dusty dirt and rocks. We were on completely flat land that looked as if it stretched on for miles. And except for a few ants that I saw crawling around below, Josh and I were the only living things as far as I could see.

"What exactly is there to see, Josh?" I said. "You would probably die of dehydration before you find any people."

He leaned back against the seat. "Then what are we supposed to do while we're waiting?"

I nodded to The Hunger Games in his hand. "Read a book."

"Very funny. I've read this book about twelve times."

"What?" I said, suddenly sitting up straight. "You have?"

"Sure. I've read the other books a lot too."

Ok, this was new. I was aware that Josh had read the series, but I didn't know that he was so in to them.

"That's cool," I said. "Who's your favorite character?"

"I don't know…. The boy tribute from District 6?"

"Very funny. But seriously, you have to have at least one favorite character."

He sighed. "Fine. I choose Buttercup."

Now I laughed.

Josh looked at his watch. He tapped it and looked up at me. "It's not working."

"That's what you get for buying a smart watch," I teased. "You could have at least expected that, considering we sort of just switched centuries."

"Fair enough." He sighed and picked up the book, flipping through the pages. "Honestly, I don't even know how your invention reads this thing. One reason is because it seems impossible that a machine could suddenly develop ideas of its own. The second reason is that most of these words are run together. You can't even distinguish a paragraph, let alone the whole book."

"There are a lot of mysteries in the world. But they wouldn't be mysteries if you knew the secret."

He shrugged. "True story."

In the first moment of true silence that we had, I heard it. It was a strange yet familiar whirring sound that was growing in volume. Josh noticed it too, and we immediately began looking all around. It seemed as if there was nothing as far as I could see. But suddenly, like a flash flood of horror, a helicopter-like object sped in toward us.

My hands went instantly to the power button. I felt as if every ounce of my being depended on this machine at the moment. But the way fate works is sometimes not in the way we like it.

The machine would not come on.

"Josh!" I exclaimed. "Run!"

Survival instinct kicked in at this point, and I didn't even look back to see if he was following me. I just kept running, and running, and running.

_ Never stop. Never stop. Never stop!_

I would have said the words aloud if it wouldn't make me lose breath faster.

All too soon it seemed like my legs were burning. What was taking so long? The hovercraft appeared quickly out of nowhere, so wouldn't it be able to catch me? Suddenly I wondered if I was running for nothing. The rebellion was over, right? It could have just been a transportation hovercraft that randomly flew by.

But when I spun around, I discovered that it had been delayed because of the time machine. My invention no longer sat on the ground, but had been pulled into the hovercraft. And now, the flying object was headed straight for me. I would never be able to outrun it. Besides, Josh was not with me. They had probably captured him from behind me.

It took two seconds for it to reach me. A man in a harness fell from the aircraft and stopped just before hitting the ground. He pulled me tightly against him, and I felt something incredibly sharp penetrate my arm.

I knew this drug. It made my skin feel ice cold. My eyes began to close on their own, and I could no longer feel my limbs. The last thing I remembered was the feeling of being lifted into the air.


	4. Chapter 4

I tried to open my eyes, but somehow my vision was still dark. I would have known if the substance was wearing off if I had been able to hear something and tell if it was distorted or not. But the place I was in was eerily silent.

I tried to bring my hands up to rub my eyes, as if that might help me see. Although, I find that it is very hard to move your hands when they're restrained to a table.

Within another minute, things started to appear. The room I was in was almost too dark for me to see anything, actually. But somehow it was light enough for me to make out a table that was about six feet away. Other than that, the room seemed vacant.

_Where am I? What are they going to do to me? _Something suddenly occurred to me.

"Josh!" I called. But I only heard my own cry bouncing off the walls of the nearly empty room. I wondered where I was… But I somehow was more concerned for my friend. I'd been through the Capitol's schemes. I wouldn't totally expect everything, but I knew that I stood more of a chance than he did.

All of a sudden, a painful amount of light filled the room. That was when I noticed that there were bulbs on the ceiling. I heard a door close above my head, but couldn't manage to see who had turned on the light. The flat table that I was on began to tilt upwards so that I was basically restricted to a vertical plank. I hated the way my wrists and ankles pressed against the restraints to keep me from falling forward.

"You must be afraid," a man's voice said from behind me.

"Only slightly," I replied boldly. "I'm mostly curious."

"And here I am wondering if you've changed since your last trip here. Curiosity is a very bad habit, Haley."

I felt my wrists tense in the restraints. "You know who I am?"

The man finally came around to the front of me. He was tall and very thin. His hair was bleached blonde and only came down to the middle of his forehead. He wore futuristic-looking glasses and a black skintight shirt. Everything else that he wore was also a sleek black color. He was probably about thirty-five years old.

"Of course I know who you are." He pulled a small brown book out of his pocket and set it on the table.

I knew he wanted me to ask what it was. I hated to gratify him, but I couldn't help myself. "Does that say that I was here before?"

He nodded. "And much more. Haley Green, allow me to introduce you to the diary of President Snow."

I tried to look confused so he would tell me more.

"It was a book only known to the president himself," the man continued. He picked up the book and flipped through the pages. "Ex-president Paylor discovered it one day when searching the rooms of the mansion. Unfortunately, she died an accidental death without getting a chance to read it." The way he stressed the last sentence suggested that there was nothing accidental about Paylor's death at all. "Therefore, many of her things were stored away. But I somehow managed to get my hands on this."

"So…. Don't you think you should introduce yourself?" I asked.

He laughed. "That is something I will never do. But you can call me… Formend."

"Alright, _Formend_, what exactly do you plan to gain by having me tied to this table?"

"First of all, you aren't 'tied' to the table. They're the most state-of-the-art restraints in all of Panem." He patted the technology proudly. "They were designed by Beetee himself. And second, I have much to gain. Because you're going to die, I'll come right out and say that I am going to be the new ruler of Panem."

"What's your current political status?" I asked, trying to get as much information out of him as I could.

"Now _that_ is none of your concern."

I pulled against my restraints, even though I knew nothing would happen. My voice suddenly became very deep and demanding. "Where's Josh?"

"I was hoping you would ask that," Formend said, flashing a slightly malicious smile. He pushed a white button that was on the wall and two men immediately came in. They were each dressed in identical dark uniforms and had belts that definitely didn't lack weapons.

"Take her downstairs," Formend commanded. "She goes second."

"What are you saying about 'second'?" I cut in. "You can't do anything to Josh."

He pressed another button on the wall, and the restraints that bound my hands and feet opened, causing me to drop painfully to the concrete floor. I stood up, but still rubbed my left wrist in an attempt to dull the pain I'd felt when it hit the ground.

One of the guards walked toward me with more restraints in his hand. A plan instantly formed in my mind and, when he was close enough, I picked up the lightweight table beside me and threw it at him. The guard stumbled backwards and I made a dash for the door. It wasn't locked, so I ran through and began to run down the long hall in an attempt to find an exit.

But I was torn between two options. One option was to get out as quickly as I possibly could and bring back help from somewhere else so I could rescue Josh more easily. The other was to run through a building I didn't know (with three men chasing me) and try to save him myself, just in case I might be too late any other way. The odds were definitely not in my favor, but I decided that my friend came first.

Instead of continuing on a straight path, I immediately opened a door that was to my left and shut it behind me. I was now at the top of a very steep set of stairs that went down.

I hurried down the stairs for quite some time. It was amazing that a straight set like that could go on for so long. I could hear footsteps behind me, but Formend and his guards were far back and couldn't catch me at this point.

Finally, I came to the last stair and jumped off of it. I was now in a room that was completely black, with no doors or windows. The realization that I'd just led myself into a death trap finally hit me. In the words of my dad, what was I not thinking?

Now what? Was I just supposed to wait until Formend came down the stairs to recapture me?

But then I heard something. It was like running water, but it did not come from above me. By instinct, I got down on my knees and put my ear to the ground. There was no doubt that there was water directly under me.

I began to look along the floor. It was dirty concrete, and I now noticed that there was slight moisture in the small cracks. As I neared the corner of the room, I found a very small knob that blended in with the ground. I pulled on it with all my strength, and what I saw below seemed as if it would be in my worst nightmares.

It was water. Only water. I smelled something similar to chlorine wafting up through the hole I'd opened. But what scared me the most was my best friend in the center of it all, struggling to stay afloat.

I heard footsteps at the end of the stairs. Without even thinking, I jumped into the hole. The second before I hit the water, I heard someone cover up our only escape.

There are many reasons you shouldn't jump into water that smells like strong chemicals. The biggest reason is that those chemicals might just be dangerous.

I resurfaced as quickly as I could. Whatever dangerous substance they had put in the water, it made my skin burn like never before. I was afraid to open my eyes for fear that the water would get into them. But I had to see. So I opened them, and was instantly met with an extreme stinging pain. I wasn't sure if the liquid that streamed off my face was water or my own tears.

When I stopped crying enough tosee, I could tell that Josh had tried to warn me. I was probably so overwhelmed with anxiety that I didn't hear him. But now he looked at me with an expression that was half scolding and half desperate.

"Haley, don't get any water in your mouth," he said quickly. I could tell that he was having trouble staying above the water.

"You can't swim?" I asked, taking his hands and trying to keep us both at the surface.

"It's not that. I'm tied to the floor."

"What?"

Josh looked down into the lightly colored water. "They put ropes on my feet before the water started coming in."

"But there's none coming in anymore," I said. "Why would they only let the water go up as far as you can?"

"My guess is that whatever they put in it is poisonous." He reached out and quickly wiped away a drop that almost went in my eye. "They want you to die slowly and painfully, instead of drowning."

I didn't want to admit it, but I knew that Josh was right.


	5. Chapter 5

**Please tell me that I'm not the only one who forgets to put the chapter into the Doc Manager first? Hahaha.**

* * *

No matter how much I tensed my muscles, tightened my jaw, or pretended like I couldn't feel anything, I just wasn't able to get the terrible stinging on my skin to go away. Josh had been in the water even longer than I had, and he still looked like he wasn't used to it.

"Wow, sunburns seem really mild compared to this stuff," he said. "When I get back, I'll probably never go swimming again."

"Josh, you don't honestly think that we'll get out of here… Do you?"

He shrugged. "I can't think of a single way to escape. I'm just trying to keep the mood cheerful."

I tried to smile, but I couldn't bring myself to forget the incredible pain I was in. I just replied, "Well, I probably would go swimming. I don't want to turn into a Johanna Mason."

He managed to laugh. It echoed in the room and reminded me of good times. But how he did laugh right now was beyond my reasoning.

"I'm serious," I continued. "She's the absolute freakiest character in the whole trilogy."

"What about President Snow? Or Coin?"

"They're normal compared to her."

Josh shook his head. "So strange, you are."

"I think you spent a little too much time in Star Wars world. You're starting to sound like Yoda."

"You and your humor…" He was smiling, but I could tell by his face that his skin was still burning as much as mine was, if not more.

"Are you starting to feel anything other than the stinging?" I asked.

"My head hurts quite a bit," he answered, still trying to sound bright. "But it's mostly my skin. I don't know if these are just ordinary pool chemicals to a deadly amount, or something that actually kills you on purpose."

At that moment, I remembered something. I moved closer to Josh and took out his pocketknife.

He raised his eyebrows. "Wow, I could've at least remembered that…"

"If we are going to die, I don't want it to be completely by their standards," I said. Without another word, I ducked under the poisonous water and swam down.

I didn't open my eyes of course; I may be stupid at times, but not _that _stupid. My face burned so painfully, but I managed to get a hold of whatever rope they had tied to my friend's ankles. I had thought to open the pocketknife before I went under, luckily, and now sawed blindly at one rope while trying not to cut my own hand. Who knows what painful torture it would be to get that water into an open wound?

I was losing air quickly. With so much pain now encircling my face, I became worried and thus felt the need to resurface. I was glad Josh had a sharp knife. One rope was cut by the time I absolutely had to bring myself up to breathe.

"Haley, are you crazy?" Josh said, instantly grabbing me by the shoulders. "That won't make things any better."

I felt him brush my face clear of loose drops of water. He spent a few seconds trying to dry my eyes as much as possible before I opened them. It was still painful, but not as unbearable as it had been before.

"I'm sorry," I choked out. "I just can't stand to see them win."

"Just accept the fact that they have."

I didn't need to wait for his approval to go back under. This time, I hadn't filled my lungs with as much air and felt like I could drown at that moment. But I worked on the rope, nevertheless. With how fast I was cutting back and forth, and with my eyes closed, I didn't noticed that the hand I used to hold the rope had slid down. And, before I could stop myself, I felt the blade of the knife rip through my skin.

I was up in an instant. The poisonous water seeped into my eyes, but I could just barely make out a cut across a joint in my thumb. I dropped the knife into the water and clutched my hand in extreme agony. Josh hurriedly put his hand over my mouth to stifle my scream.

In sixteen years of my life, I had never experienced so much physical pain. It almost felt like the water was tearing through internal parts of my hand, and that it wouldn't stop until there was nothing left.

Josh was completely silent, and took my hand to look at it. I had blinked away the water in my eyes and could see him turn a shade paler. He looked at me. "The knife?"

I nodded and felt my eyes flood with tears.

I took my hand back from him and kept it above water at all costs. I suddenly wished I could die at that moment so I wouldn't have to experience the feeling of burning anymore.

"To think that we didn't even get to say goodbye to our families…" I managed to say. "Mine will think I lied to them. I told them I would never use the machine again."

"None of this is your fault, Haley," he replied solemnly. "I took the machine in the first place, and I left it on and got us stuck here."

"Josh… You're my best friend. Anything that you do is forgivable."

"We're dying," he said. "That's not forgivable."

I looked at him with sympathy. "At least we're together. If I was in here all by myself, then I might have to blame you."

"But if you were by yourself, you wouldn't have cut your hand."

I sighed in frustration. "You're too good at arguing."

At the same time, we looked at each other, startled. We must've both heard the loud pounding that sounded as if it was coming from the other side of one of the walls. I was intrigued, but Josh looked suspicious.

"You don't think they're going to take us out of here, do you?" I asked him.

He shrugged. "Only if they think that this isn't cruel punishment enough and just want to make us suffer more."

So, I could have lived without _that _comment…

My brain started to go through a list of things they might do to torture us. Shock us? Beat us? Amputate our limbs? Or there was always that possibility of letting us get ripped to pieces by some sort of muttation.

But as time went on, with the sounds still going outside of our torment room, my mind grew more hopeful. If they were trying to get us out, why were they struggling so much? It was their building.

But as quickly as they had come, the pounding noises stopped. I looked at Josh again. "Maybe it was nothing."

"I don't know. It sounded pretty real to me."

The next thing happened so quickly that I can barely even tell you what went on. I just know that there was a bang so loud that my stomach was doing summersaults- literally. I felt myself get pulled underwater instantly.

When I opened my eyes, I found myself lying soaked on the ground. It took me a second to even find the strength to sit up. When I did, I saw a huge hole in a thick concrete wall. On the other side of the wall was the room I had just been trapped in. I quickly understood what had happened when I noticed the man standing next to me.

Whoever he was, he had gotten me out of the room of water. Josh was already standing next to him. Maybe I'd gotten knocked out when I washed out of the hole in the wall.

The man held out his hand and I was slowly able to stand again. As my mind became clearer, I realized that the pain on my skin was slightly less, but that my cut was still unbearable. I put my other hand tightly around it like I was bracing myself.

"I hope you two aren't hurt," the man said, surveying Josh and me. "Well, more than you already appear to be."

"I think we're ok at the moment," Josh said. "If you don't mind me asking, though, who are you?"

"Philo Augusto," he replied. "I'm taking it that you two kids are not from around here?"

"You've got that right," I said. "What district are we in?"

"You don't know? This is District 2."

District 2; hence Philo's Roman-sounding name. Considering the fact that we'd been abducted and tortured, but then saved without much evident trouble, my brain began to hurt. So I just came right out and said, "This is after the rebellion, right?"

I had expected a very surprised expression to accompany my question. But for some strange reason, Philo didn't wonder why I asked. He just nodded. "It's been about… 25 years, maybe? I was just barely old enough for the Games when the rebels took over."

Considering he lived in District 2, that could've been a bad thing.

"Anyway," he continued, "We'd better get out of here. No doubt they're going to find out you're gone."

"Should we run?" Josh asked him.

Philo chuckled. "If you feel up to it. But we can't the whole time- my house is several miles from here."

"Then how did you find us?"

"I looked out my window and saw the hovercraft fly by. They don't usually come way out here, so I followed it. When I saw you two being led in there, unconscious, I figured something was happening. It's complete luck that I guessed the right wall to blow out."

I wasn't sure why, but something about the whole situation seemed too easy. It's not like I was going to say that out loud, though. So Philo, Josh, and I began running as fast as we could without fainting from the heat. Although I was glad to feel dry after being imprisoned in the water for so long, I felt like my body was trying to absorb the poisonous chemicals that still remained on my skin in an attempt to cool down.

We ran for a while. But eventually, Josh ran out of steam and just couldn't go that fast anymore. So we all stopped and began walking now. The building was out of sight, but I still felt pretty on-edge.

"So, Philo, how exactly is Panem faring politically?" Josh asked. I shook my head as a sign that he shouldn't bring it up, but Philo answered anyway.

"Fair," he replied. "Although I'm not liking President Paylor's replacement as much as I did her."

"Who's her replacement?" My friend continued. I sent him a death glare. The last thing we needed was for Philo to get suspicious.

"Tauria Hilt," he said. "Paylor wanted to keep things… Feminine, I suppose." Philo shook his head. "Women sure can cause trouble."

"You're right about that one," Josh said, looking at me.

I stopped the conversation short. "I feel like we're being followed."

"Yeah, because we just escaped our death."

"No, I honestly think there's someone following us," I persisted.

"Haley," Josh said, "Look around you. We're in the middle of nowhere, on flat ground. We would be able to see whoever is following us."

"It shouldn't be too long before we get back to my house," Philo said, continuing on at a steady pace. "You two can stay there until we find a way to get you home. Where are you from?" He looked at our clothes. "The Capitol, maybe?"

"Well…" I trailed off. "It's kind of hard to-"

But I was cut short. Philo fell to the ground- dead. In his back there was a dart and a wound that now seeped blood.

* * *

**Just so you know, the next chapter is where I start bringing in the familiar characters :D**


	6. Chapter 6

Josh and I looked around frantically for a sign of the shooter. It seemed as if the dart had come out of nowhere. Somehow I thought to look up eventually. At first the sky just seemed to be the cloudless blue that it was. But if I kept my eyesight focused for long enough, it almost seemed like something was moving ever so slightly directly above us. But how?

I'll tell you how; it was a hovercraft.

This hovercraft wasn't like the ones I'd seen during my experience in the 65th Games, nor like the one that Josh and I had been captured in. It completely blended into the sky, giving the term, 'vanish into thin air', a whole new meaning. And it looked like it was much higher in altitude than a normal one.

Whoever was in the hovercraft, they must have seen me watching. It somehow instantly went on a vertical zoom and came down to the level of a normal one. Josh noticed it now and clutched my arm, signaling me to run. But something about this turn of events glued my eyes to the ladder that began descending from the craft. There was a man on the end of it. When he reached the ground, he didn't pull out some sort of needle to drug us with. He simply took out a small, rectangular box and stuck it to my arm.

I didn't know what, but something made the box stick to me. And the strange thing about it was the feeling of heat waves it sent through my body, beginning from my left arm and shooting all the way through to my right. I felt something in my brain stop working and achieved sudden terror because I couldn't move any part of my body. The man picked me up with ease and moved me towards the ladder. He closed my hands around a rung and gave a signal. I was frozen in place as I was being pulled up into who knows what.

The next thing I remember was the feeling of my skin being tugged on. A sudden harsh pull occurred, and my mind came back into reality. A man stood before me with the strange rectangular box in his hand. I looked to my arm and found that the box had made a light bruise, but left no sort of puncture wounds.

I was obviously inside of the hovercraft. It took me a moment to think of looking for Josh. But, thankfully, he was in a chair right beside me. He still seemed to be coming out of his daze.

I stood up quickly and approached the man who'd taken the box off my arm. "Where are we?" I demanded. "This is kind of frustrating considering we just escaped a dangerous situation."

"You don't have anything to worry about," he said. "We're the good guys."

"Really? How do you think you can prove that?"

"I'm Green Leader."

I wasn't convinced.

"You know- the leader of the P.G.R.T.?" He continued. "Also commonly known as Commander Hawthorne?"

Realization hit me. "Gale Hawthorne?"

He nodded. "Since birth."

"Oh… I understand now." I sat back down in my seat, slightly dumbfounded.

"You look confused," Gale said, taking off the black gloves he wore. "Did they erase some memory at wherever you were?"

"Ok, I don't know _how _you found us, but there are some more important things that I don't currently know," I began. "Let's just say… Let's just say that I don't know anything about modern day Panem at all. Explain your job to me as if I have no clue what is going on in the world."

He raised an eyebrow in a mixture of confusion and curiosity. Nevertheless, he gave me the details. "The P.G.R.T stands for Panem Government Rescue Team. We're sort of like… Modern day Peacekeepers, you could say. Except that we work for the good of everyone in Panem. Anyone who tries to bring back old Capitol ways is wanted dead or alive. Part of our team captures the revengeful ones. But my unit on the team rescues anyone who is harmed or detained by such people." He nodded at me. "Like you."

"Speaking of which," I said, "Do you know of any chemical that can burn when it comes in contact with skin, but doesn't actually cause visible physical damage?"

"There are a few, but most of them are kept locked up by the government for safety. Why?"

"Well, the man who held us captive was torturing us with whatever it is. He put us in a room filled with water that was saturated with the stuff."

He spoke into an object that resembled a walkie-talkie. "Get me medical testing supplies in the flight room."

A woman dressed in a black uniform soon emerged from another part of the craft. She held a kit with a cross on it. Gale took the kit from her and began going through the contents of it. The suspense nearly killed me, but finally, he turned around. In his hands was a bottle filled with clear liquid and several strips of paper that looked similar to the kind that people tested pool chemicals with.

He knelt down in front of me and told me to put out my hand. "This will probably sting a little," he said. He dripped some of the liquid onto my index finger and I felt it burn my skin, almost like the poison had earlier. Gale waited a moment, and then pressed one of the strips to the water droplet, absorbing it all and making the pain instantly leave.

He looked at his watch. After what I assumed was a minute, he looked at the strip. More concern etched into his eye as he studied the results. "It's just what I was afraid of," he said. "Magnopolium."

"What's that?" I asked fearfully.

"If a large amount gets into the body, most functions start to shut down after eight hours," he said. "How long has it been since you were first exposed to the water?"

"Probably about an hour and a half?" I guessed. "You don't mean that we're going to… Die? Do you?"

Gale looked into my eyes as if apologizing to me. But then he spoke into his walkie-talkie again and said, "Engage jets, captain. I repeat, engage the jets. We need to get back to HQ as soon as possible."

I looked at Josh. He was already staring at me with eyes filled to the brink with fear. I wondered how much of our conversation he had caught.

"Josh, I'm sure they'll figure out something," I lied to him. I took his hand, which had gone cold. "Don't give up yet."

"Neither of you had any open wounds when you were in the water, did you?" Gale asked.

Josh didn't say anything, but looked at my sliced hand. I swallowed hard and said, "I did. I cut myself."

Our rescuer immediately asked to see my cut. I held out my hand and he wore a grave expression on his face. He began speaking to other hovercraft crew again. "I need the medical staff in the flight room immediately. We'll need the incision tools."

"Incision?" I felt my head get light. "You mean, cutting?"

"It has to be done," he said. "In some cases where immediate incision wasn't performed, the effected area had to be amputated completely."

I bit my lip so hard that I think it bled. "Isn't there some way that you can knock me out? Don't you keep any supplies for that on board?"

"Yes, but it's extremely limited. We only give it to people who are half insane or that require urgent surgery." He paused, seeing my expression. "You shouldn't worry- it won't take long. But they have to drain however much poison got in your blood."

Three new women in black uniforms came to me with a different kit. To think that I'd survived part of a Hunger Games, and now a cut on my hand might kill me? That morning I'd woken up in my own bed, and now I was 236 years away from my family. The whole thing was strange and horrifying to ponder.

I felt like I was going to faint right then and there when I saw a nurse pull out a small knife. But to my surprise, Gale immediately took my uninjured hand- my right- and squeezed it tightly.

"Just look at me," he instructed. "Don't think about it."

I felt more of the burning clear liquid being applied to my hand, but I didn't look at it. "Can't you just hit me to knock me out or something?" I pleaded.

"Forget about that hand. Tell me your name."

"Haley Green."

"Interesting," he said. "My wife's name is Camilla, and you remind me of her quite a bit. She's very strong-willed."

Something sharp grazed my skin and I almost let a tear fall from my eye. Nevertheless, I still tried to keep it out of my mind. "I'm not very strong-willed," I continued.

"Hasn't anyone ever told you that before? Either way, I think you are. Are you from District 2? Or somewhere else?"

"I can't really answer that question right now," I said.

"Alright, you can tell me that later." Gale looked out of the corner of his eye, and it wasn't subtle the way he gripped my hand tighter. "I have two sons and a daughter," he said. "Lucius is twenty, Marcus is seventeen, and Julia is sixteen. They would probably really like you." He paused. "How old are you?"

I didn't have time to answer. The pain had been extreme until now, but when I felt something- most likely a needle- go deep in to my cut, it was unbearable. I was glad that Josh had seen it coming and now covered my mouth again as I screamed.

I couldn't bring myself to look at what had happened. I withdrew my right hand from Gale's and covered my eyes, as if they might not be able to tell that I was crying. I felt Josh put his arm around me in consolation.

"The worst is over," Gale said quietly.

After that, no one said anything for a while. The nurses continued to make some less painful cuts on my hand, but we were all quiet. I kept myself from looking at my left hand, and Josh now held my right. I would've given anything to go home at that time.

The next thing I became aware of was something soft being wrapped around my hand. I finally allowed my eyes to look at the product of the nurses' work; it was simply my entire hand encased by a white cloth that stayed together and resembled a cast.

"This will hold until we get back to HQ," the tallest nurse said, picking up the kit.

"Thank you," Gale said. The three women left after that.

"What's going to happen at HQ?" Josh asked him.

"I can assure you that it won't be painful," he answered. "You two will probably have to soak in clean water for a few hours. You'll also have to drink a quart of water every day until all signs of the Magnopolium are gone."

"What about after that?" I asked.

"A common symptom of the chemical is fatigue. I know for a fact that we're almost out of recovery space in the hospital right now. But, if you want, you can stay at my house. I'm sure my wife would love to have guests for a few days."

"We wouldn't want to bother you," I said.

"It wouldn't be that way," he replied. "I've had people stay in my house in the past for this reason. Anyway, you can just think about it for a while. I'm going to go ask the captain how long it is until we land."

Once Gale was gone, Josh said, "Haley, how are we going to get home? Bleached blonde villain guy still has the time machine."

"We'll have to tell Gale about it sooner or later," I said. "Without someone else's help, we don't stand a chance at getting it back."

"You don't think he knows that we're from the past already, do you?"

I shook my head. "Even if he had seen me on TV with Finnick, I don't think he would remember. He would've been about eight years old when that Hunger Games was on. And he's…. What? Forty-five now?"

"He sure doesn't look it, though."

Josh was right about that. Gale looked forty at most. He didn't have any signs of gray hair, and he still stood straight and tall. It was strange that his age didn't show, considering all the things he'd been through in his lifetime.

"I'm starting to understand why you never told anyone that you came here," Josh said quietly.

I nodded. "If you told some major fan that you could transport them into this story, they wouldn't hesitate at all. It's hard to consider how much danger there actually is here."

"I'm sorry," he said. "For everything; for using the machine, for being curious about all of this… I'm just really sorry."

"Like I said, it's always forgivable. You didn't know."

Gale came back into the room. "It should be ten minutes maximum. You two will have immediate entry into the hospital. How is your hand, Haley? Are you feeling any extreme pain right now?"

I wished he didn't ask me. The more I thought about it, the more it hurt. "It's mostly just a sore, tender feeling. Will it heal up on its own, or are they going to have to do something else to it?"

"They'll just have to clean it and put a waterproof wrap around it. Now you'd both better put a belt on for when we land."

Josh did as he was told, but I couldn't manage to buckle myself in with what was practically a white pillow encasing my hand. Gale saw my struggling and fastened it for me before sitting down in his own seat.

"By the way," I said, "This is Josh."

Gale nodded toward my friend. "Hello, Josh. Are you sixteen too?"

He nodded. "Yeah. Hopefully I live to be seventeen."

I sent Josh a warning out of the corner of my eye. Eventually I would have to explain our situation to Gale, but now was not the time for it.

Within five minutes, the hovercraft touched down at what I assumed was either headquarters or the hospital. I didn't even get the chance to ask, because men dressed entirely in black flooded into the flying contraption and took me by the arms. They quickly led me out of the hovercraft, through a set of swinging doors, and into a white room.

"Wait, where's Josh?!" I said frantically. "Josh!"

From a nearby place in the hospital I heard him call my name. I wanted to stay with him- no, I _needed_ to stay with him. I didn't want this to turn into another trip to the future where I was surrounded by people I didn't know. I had to be close to my best friend.

But of course, the odds are usually against you in Panem- Hunger Games or no Hunger Games. I couldn't manage to break free and watched with remorse as the door to my room shut, leaving me stuck inside with strangers.

* * *

**I'm rather excited about the next chapter ;) What do you think of Gale's personality? I wanted to make him mature, but a little more happy than he was in the original trilogy. Reasons being that he got married, he has kids, he's moved on in life, etc. Do you like it, or is it just too OOC for you?**


	7. Chapter 7

For five painfully long days, I was alternated between a hospital bed and a gigantic tub of water. In my previous Panem experience, my family hadn't exactly been my main concern. But now, as time ticked away, I hoped that they weren't on the brink of a heart attack. How many days had I been in the arena before? I knew that it was probably somewhere around a week. But at this rate, it might take me several more days just to get the time machine back.

Whenever I wasn't being dunked in water, I was stuck in an uncomfortable bed drinking water that may have had charcoal in it. On my first day I had tried to escape my room to find Josh. Unfortunately, I was caught by a nurse, and now had a chain holding my right ankle to the end of the bed. Lovely.

My injured hand had healed completely- well, except for the diagonal scar that was left. It was strange to think that I'd been able to take a piece of Finnick's shirt back with me before, and would now have a permanent reminder of this trip. How exactly was I going to explain that to everyone that asked? Maybe I could ask a Capitol surgeon if they could erase the mark.

When I really took time to ponder what life would be like when I went home, I wondered if I could in fact tell people where I had been. I would destroy the machine this time- crushing any hopes of ever going back again. But what would happen to me? And Josh, for that matter? Word would get out that we were time travelers somehow… No one would believe us, would they? If they did, our lives would change in an instant.

* * *

At last, I saw a familiar face. It was on the sixth day of my hospital imprisonment that Gale came into the room with a fabric tote bag in his hands. Without a word, he unlocked the chain that bound me and put the bag in my lap.

"Am I free?" I asked.

He gave me an amused look. "Yes. I have strict orders to make you drink clean water everyday, though." He nodded toward the bag. "My daughter is letting you borrow some clothes, since yours got the Magnopolium on them. There are also some other things from her in there. I'll let you change, and then we'll go to my house."

"Is Josh going to?"

"Of course. I think he misses you."

I smiled. Gale left and I went into the restroom. Based on what I'd overheard here and there, every room in the hospital had its own restroom. For some reason, it seemed nice to see a government spending money on hospitals.

The first thing I saw in the bathroom was my reflection in the mirror looking back at me. But what I saw just about made me drop the tote bag.

My hair was no longer a neutral dishwater shade, but had become an undeniable light blonde. I felt it, just to ensure that I wasn't imagining things. Yep, it was real alright. But how? The only logical explanation that I could think of would be that the Magnopolium did it. When I thought about it, I realized that it could have happened the instant I went under the poisonous water. I knew this because, through this entire experience in the future, I hadn't looked in a mirror until now.

I couldn't waste time, though. I somehow managed to take my eyes away from the mirror and instead focused them on what was inside the bag. Gale had told me his daughter's name on the hovercraft, but I didn't remember it at the time. Well, whoever she was, her wardrobe obviously consisted of solid-colored shirts and jeans. There was one thing I noticed about the clothing, though- there were no brand names. I guess that made sense. If the only real clothing factories after the rebellion were in District 8, then naturally they wouldn't have brand names, right?

After I slid on the clothing items, which, somehow, were all my exact size, I discovered a hairbrush in the bottom of the bag. And with it there was also a new toothbrush, futuristic-looking toothpaste, a ponytail, and a pair of black tennis shoes.

I used everything in the tote bag and eventually emerged from my hospital room to discover Gale and Josh waiting outside the door. Without a word, Josh and I immediately came together in an unbreakable hug. I was so glad to finally see my friend, and he seemed equally as happy.

"Are you ok?" He asked, without letting me go.

"Yes. Are you?"

"I'm fine."

The sight of Gale still waiting made me pull away from Josh. He then motioned for us to follow him out of the building and onto a wide dirt road.

"My house is less than a mile from here," he said. "Are you two up to walking?"

"I think so," I replied. "Do you walk every day?"

Gale nodded. "District 2 has quite a few means of transportation, but I like walking. Besides, this is the hospital; I usually only have to walk to headquarters, which is closer to my house."

It was as if Josh had just noticed my hair when he spoke up. "Wow, that's an interesting shade."

"Yeah, about that," I said to Gale, "Do you think it's from the Magnopolium?"

"Probably."

"Well why didn't you tell me before I almost fainted at the sight of myself?"

"I didn't tell you about the harmless side effects," he said. "You could also lose hair; so really, you got the better part of the deal."

"So, what does that mean for me?" Josh asked nervously.

I laughed. "You'll be fine."

"Oh really?"

"I'm pretty sure you would already be bald by now if it were to happen to you. Besides," I smiled and patted his head, "I would be willing to have a hairless friend."

"That's not funny, Haley…" But he still had the faintest shadow of a smile on his face.

"Anyway," Gale said, "How did you like our hospital?"

"They're very strict when it comes to recovery," I answered. "They chained me to my bed."

"Wow, you got off luckier than I did," Josh said. "Evidently you got the last bed. They locked me in a room with about six billion bottles of water and a couch."

"Oh, I'm sorry, Josh," I said. "I would've let you have the bed if I would have known."

He shrugged. "It doesn't really matter now. We'll be able to go home soon."

I elbowed him. Really, he had to be more careful about what he let slip out of his mouth. My worry started to decrease after a few seconds, but then, Gale asked, "So where _are _you from?"

"We're…" My mind went blank. What could I say?

"We're from District 1," Josh cut in for me. It was a good thing he did, or else I might've exploded.

"That's good," Gale said. "Then we'll be able to get you home soon."

Unfortunately, he didn't even know how long it would probably take.

I thought of bringing up a question I initially asked myself but had forgotten to mention. "So, when you rescued us, why did you shoot Philo?"

"He was wanted in six districts for associating with our most elusive criminal," Gale answered. "He was too dangerous to be left alive for questioning."

"Who is your most elusive criminal?" I asked.

"He goes by the name Heat- obviously that isn't his real name. He, on the other hand, is wanted in all thirteen districts and the Capitol."

"What does he do?"

"That's what is so confusing about him," he said. "He captures people randomly and tortures them. Philo's part of the deal was to break them out and trick them into answering political questions. We're guessing Heat's trying to find out more about the districts." Gale paused for a minute. "I don't tell many people this, but I think he's trying to get a political foothold."

My meeting with 'Formend' came back to me. He was Heat, wasn't he? There was no other logical explanation. He couldn't have been so ignorant as to let the girl from the past go. If he was who Gale was looking for, he had something truly devious in mind.

We walked in silence for the rest of the way. There were so many questions I wanted to ask Gale. I couldn't ask Finnick many, since he was twenty-four when his participation in the book plot actually started. But Gale was there through it all. He knew Katniss. He survived the rebellion. I wished I could bring some of it up.

When we arrived at the Hawthorne house, I was actually surprised at how large it was. I suppose I shouldn't have been, since he had an important and most likely well-paying job, but still… For some reason I'd expected a house resembling one that could be in District 12. Gale led us up the path to the front door. He inserted a strange looking key and opened the door.

Upon entering the house, I was flooded with a feeling of warmth. It was then that I realized how warm it had been outside for this time of the year. I would have to ask about that later. But what really got to me was the smell of fresh bread completely saturating the air. This wasn't where Peeta lived- so who was the amazing cook?

A woman emerged from a doorway. Her hair was dark brown and flowed in a bouncy way just past her shoulders. She was a fair height- probably only an inch taller than me. I knew that her glowing and kind face would be engraved into my mind forever.

"Oh, Gale, they're perfect!" She said, coming towards us. Gale tried to wrap his arms around her waist, but her hospitable nature overrode it and she instead focused on me and Josh.

"I'm Haley Green," I said, holding out my hand for her to shake. But to my surprise, she put her arms around me in a friendly hug.

"I'm so glad you're finally here! Gale told me that we'd have you two soon. You're my first teenage guests ever, so I got extremely excited." She hugged Josh just as warmly. "What's your name?"

"Josh Andrews," he replied. "Thank you for letting us stay here."

"Oh Josh, it's a pleasure more than anything," she said, never letting the smile leave her face. She suddenly put her hands to her cheeks in mild shock. "How rude! I forgot to mention that I'm Camilla. Just Camilla, though. None of this 'Mrs. Hawthorne' business."

I matched her warm smile. "Well, thank you for such a nice welcome, Camilla."

"Would you like to go to your rooms now?" Gale cut in kindly. "Lucius is around here somewhere, but you can meet the other two after they get home from school."

"Thanks… Uh…" I trailed off. I hadn't called Gale by name yet. Would he be alright with that, or would he prefer something like 'Mr. Hawthorne'?

"Just call me Gale," he finished for me. "It's easier that way."

"Ok, thanks, Gale."

Gale led Josh to his room, and Camilla took me up the stairs to mine. Even the guest bedrooms in their modern-looking house were spacious and nice. I loved that there was a large canopy bed against the wall.

"I hope this room is clean enough," Camilla said. "I told Julia to dust yesterday."

"This room is better than perfect," I said happily. "I can't thank you enough for all you've done."

She sat on the bed, which had a plush blue comforter, and patted the spot beside her. Once I was sitting with her, she said, "I'm so excited that you're finally here. The first day that you were in the hospital Gale told me that you'd be staying here later. I instantly fell in love with you two, even though I hadn't met you."

"You're so kind," I said.

Camilla smiled. "Trust me, I wasn't always. I'm lucky to have ended up with Gale."

The stars in her eyes when she said the last sentence led me to believe that she and Gale were absolutely perfect for each other. If I remembered correctly, Gale told me on the hovercraft that she was strong-willed. She seemed happy to me, but maybe it had come with maturity. After all, Gale didn't seem as severe as he did in the books either. Maybe he'd gone to District 2 and found himself a better Katniss.

Maybe even Katniss was a happier person by this time.

Camilla left the room and, soon after, Josh came in. He shut the door behind him and sat on the bed beside me. "When are you planning to tell them?"

"I haven't thought it out too carefully yet," I confessed. "I was assuming bringing it up when we're well enough to go home. After all, I'm assuming doctors from our time don't know how to treat Magnopolium."

"What's going to happen when you do say it?" He asked. "Do you think the government will raid a random spot in the middle of nowhere just to get two confused kids home?" He shook his head. "They're going to ask us more questions than we can answer, you know."

"Let's just take it one day at a time," I said calmly. "If things get really bad, we'll just change our names and ask if we can join District 13 underground."

Josh actually smiled. "I didn't know it was possible for Haley Green to be irrational."

"I built a time machine- that's more irrational than everything in your life combined."

We sat there silently. I ran a finger across the new scar on my hand. Reality here seemed so virtual, when in truth, it was very real and very dangerous. Josh saw me and carefully took me by the wrist. He stared at the mark. I sighed and put my forehead on his shoulder.

"Do you really think things will get terrible?" He asked, taking his eyes off the scar but still clasping my hand in his.

I lifted my head and looked him in the eyes. "Maybe. But I guess we'll just have to keep the odds in our favor."

He smiled again.

An hour later, I sat in the kitchen, eating some of the perfect bread that Camilla had made. And with it I was obligated to drink as much water as I could possibly hold. Josh sat beside me, trying to entertain himself with a Panem history book.

Suddenly, I heard the door open. I heard a female voice. "We're home, mom!"

Camilla rushed out of the kitchen and almost immediately returned with two teenagers behind her. Josh and I stood up to meet them.

"These are my younger and youngest," Camilla said, gesturing to each person. "Marcus and Julia."

Julia hugged me, just like her mother had. Somehow it didn't surprise me, since she looked like an exact copy of Camilla, only slightly shorter. Her smile was also the same. "It's amazing to finally meet you, Haley! My dad told me about you."

"It's great to meet you too," I replied with a smile. "Thank you for the clothes."

"No trouble at all! It's a good thing you're about as big as I am."

She focused her attention on Josh for a moment after that. Marcus now held out his hand to me. "I'm Marcus."

I shook his hand, and his firm grip was strange for a seventeen year-old. "It's nice to meet you Marcus," I said.

The Hawthorne family must've had strong genetics. Julia looked like her mom, and Marcus was exactly what I had expected Gale to look like in the books- yes, I'm not even going to lie when I say that he was undeniably attractive. I wondered what Lucius looked like. I hadn't seen him around yet.

"Hopefully my mother hasn't… Overwhelmed you," he said with a mischievous smile. "Sometimes her joy is a little too much."

I laughed. "No, she's wonderful."

For a while it was all small talk. In my time, Julia would be a sophomore and Marcus would be a senior. I learned that the reason Lucius wasn't home some of the time was because he was out with a girl. Julia showed me some of her math homework, and my mind instantly began to come up with the answers. I didn't say them out loud, though. I never really found out whether forms of algebra and geometry were easier in Panem, or if I was just used to advanced math because of my former science obsession. Josh and Marcus also seemed to be getting along. They reminded me of each other a little. Both had their friendly moments, and could also maintain a quiet and kind personality.

When Lucius arrived home, I barely had time to meet him before dinner began. The Hawthorne family was very talkative at the table (especially Camilla), but Josh and I were quieter than usual. We answered questions politely and laughed at the occasional humor, but we didn't particularly bring anything up. I don't know why Josh didn't, but I knew my reason.

Soon, I would have to tell these people the truth. They might never treat me the same way again, and strangely, I would miss it. The apprehension and sadness of the situation was enough to make me worry myself to sleep that night.

* * *

**So what do you think of Gale's family? Reviews are ****extremely**** appreciated- they help me decide where to take the story next, in a way. So I love reading them :D**


	8. Chapter 8

**I'm so sorry for the extreme delay on this chapter... I have a million ideas for the story and had to word out this chapter carefully. **

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Marcus and Julia didn't have school the next day. Maybe it was Saturday. Did they have week days in Panem? Who knows? Anyway, they still had homework to do. Since Josh and I weren't exactly, you know, seniors, we weren't quite able to help Marcus as much. His math was like a mixture of calculus and something else. But when history came, we were pretty knowledgeable on the Hunger Games era.

When the story went on to after the rebellion, the book didn't say much about what happened to Katniss and Peeta. Basically, the only new information I got was that they still lived in District 12. That was pretty strange to me, considering they would have started out in a practically non-existent district. I really don't know.

"Don't you learn about this in District 1?" Julia asked. "Almost everybody already knows all these details."

"We don't go to school," Josh lied. "Haley's mom has been missing for a few years, and my parents are gone completely. We both live with her dad, and don't find out much."

She was sympathetic of our fake situation. "Oh, I'm sorry, I had no idea."

"Don't worry about it," he said. "We're alright now."

It was strange how Josh could so convincingly say something. He almost reminded me of a certain blonde haired, blue eyed baker.

"Well, my dad could probably tell you some things that the book doesn't," Marcus said. "He knew Katniss Everdeen."

"Really?" I said, although I was aware of this fact. "Did he know Peeta Mellark too?"

"A little. He said they were together during some of the rebellion."

"Alright, Marcus," Camilla said from inside the kitchen, "You know how your dad doesn't like you to mention much about the rebellion."

"Sorry, mom," he said. "But don't you think they could at least learn some information about our past?"

I heard her sigh. In a minute or two, she came into the living room with all of us and sat on the couch between me and Julia. "I met Gale a year after the rebellion ended. He was just starting to get somewhere with his job at the P.G.R.T. We were both… Scarred, you could say. I grew up without my mother, and my father died in a bombing when the rebels attacked. I was never encouraged to participate in the Hunger Games, so that could've been why Gale and I got along so well. It took six months, but finally, we were married. Unfortunately, we didn't consider some things about each other, and we fought. Over the silliest things, too.

"But one day, that all changed. I found out that we would be having a baby. Since that very day, Gale has bent over backwards to be as good as he can be." She smiled and looked flirtatious. "And over time, even my strong resolve in everything faded. We haven't had any problems- whether relational or political- for twenty years."

I smiled at her starry eyes. "That's one of the best stories I've ever heard."

"So you've lived in District 2 your whole life?" Josh asked.

Camilla nodded. "It's a little ironic that I haven't been out of it. Gale's job takes him all over Panem, and I haven't once escaped the normalcy of District 2."

Julia sighed. "I'm dreaming of one day getting out of the district. Then I can meet someone foreign and romantic in some other place- like District 4, or maybe District 7."

"Your dad won't let you out of his sight for a long time, Julia," Camilla replied, patting her daughter's knee. "Don't count on it just yet."

"I'm hoping I can join him in the P.G.R.T.," Marcus said. "I would love to have a job that's so exciting."

"Hopefully, there won't even be a need for that program in the future," Camilla said. "The activity has been diminishing, but it's not an unnecessary team yet." Suddenly, she turned to me. "What are you planning on doing in the future, Haley?"

"Me?" What would I say to that? I desperately wished that Josh could speak for me again. "I'm hoping that… I can…" I tried to hide the frustration I had for myself. "I'm hoping that I can do something different. I don't want to be stuck in the industry of my district. I can see myself doing something with books… Or maybe baking."

Marcus smiled at me. "Baking? Sorry, but I sort of pictured you more as the government involvement type."

"Oh no, definitely not," I said, nearly laughing. "I make horrible decisions. Josh would know."

My friend nodded. "She's right."

"Even if you're not close with politics, you could still do something for the country… Maybe work with the P.G.R.T.? Or possibly weaponry making."

"As long as I don't actually have to use the weapons," I replied. "I don't know how to use any."

"We might be able to teach you," Julia said, looking thoughtful. "There is an academy for teenagers who want to work in my dad's program, but he doesn't let us train there."

"Because it's too brutal," Camilla explained. "The rebels had such a strong hate for the Capitol before, so they're making sure they'll have plenty of trained people in case of a problem. Gale has seen how they teach there… He isn't a fan of it. They don't exactly have any chivalry policies when it comes to fighting."

That was proof that Gale had matured. I mean, twenty-five years before, he would have hated the Capitol that much too, right?

"Anyway," Julia continued, "He still wants us to know how to defend ourselves. Lucius has a bow, Marcus uses a sword, and I throw things like axes and knives."

"Did your dad train you with all of those?" Josh asked.

"No." Camilla smiled. "I did. Gale is more of a snare person. Basically, he's the strategic one in the family. He helped Lucius with the bow. But even though my father didn't want me to be a killing machine, I still picked up on weaponry skills from living here in District 2. So I showed Marcus and Julia some things."

"I have to say, I never pictured you as a physical fighter, Camilla," Josh said.

"I never have been. The only time I've really used any of my skills was when I was first teaching them."

"Would it be alright with you if they tried to teach us some things?" He asked.

"I suppose so. As long as Haley's father won't mind it… And you'll want to ask Gale too."

"What do you picture yourself using?" Marcus asked us.

"Definitely not a sword," Josh replied. "I don't think I have the drive to fight someone up close."

"But what if that was your only option?" I said. "An arrow might not be very helpful if you have someone near you."

"True, but an ax might."

I searched my mind. "I would like to learn sword-fighting, but I agree with Josh that I couldn't end a life up close- even if my own life depended on it."

"Chances are you won't ever need to do anything that drastic," Marcus said. "I could teach you how to use a sword, and I'll ask Lucius to show you the basics of archery. Julia can show Josh the art of… Throwing stuff."

Julia put her hands on her hips. "It's much more than 'throwing stuff' and you know that."

The front door opened quickly and Lucius entered the house.

"There you are, Lucius," Camilla said, standing up. "Where have you been all morning?"

"Septimia and I were in town," he replied, hanging his jacket on a peg in the wall. When he said Septimia he was referring to his girlfriend.

"Your dad didn't appreciate you leaving so early."

"I'm sorry. She had to be home before noon today, so we went out early." He looked at all of us gathered in the room. "What's going on?"

"Not much," Julia replied. "Just weaponry talk."

The tall older brother leaned against the wall. "What about it?"

"Haley and Josh want to learn some things."

"Only if it isn't any trouble," I said quickly. "And if your dad lets you teach us."

"I'm sure he will," Lucius said. "Which one of you wants to learn the bow?"

Marcus looked at me, which made me respond, "I do, as long as you want teach me."

Lucius smiled. His smile was very mysterious, and made his expression hard to read. But he answered, "Gladly."

* * *

That night, Gale approved of the plan. He said we could learn in the field that was a mile away.

"I would teach you myself, but unfortunately, I don't have much free time while in the P.G.R.T.," he said. Then he looked to Lucius. "I'm counting on you to make sure they learn safely."

"Don't worry, dad," his son assured, "We'll be as careful as possible."

Josh and I said a few more things than we had before, but we were still quieter than our normal selves. I looked at him for a moment. I wondered what he was thinking about. Did he still blame himself for this? Was he missing his family? Or was he just trying to take it a day at a time, like I did?

Two hours later, I shut myself in my temporary room for the night. I sighed and put my forehead to the door. All this time I had been worrying about my family. They might think I lied to them. By now wouldn't they have discovered the missing time machine? Either way, my worry turned a little more into heartache that night. It had been over a week since I'd seen the faces of my parents and sister. If I could have wished for one person at the time, it would've been my dad. He would know exactly what to do. Whereas I was only sixteen and had Josh being the sole person who understood.

Suddenly an idea formed in my brain. It wouldn't really help my situation at all, but I wanted to do it. I walked over to the dresser in my room and took a pen that was lying on top of it. I tried to count how many days I'd been in Panem so far….. Was it nine? I couldn't be extremely sure, because I didn't know how long I had been under the affect of Formend's drug. I decided on nine though. I rolled up the sleeve on my shirt and made nine tally marks on my shoulder. Maybe this way I wouldn't lose track of the days.

After that, I discarded the pen and crawled into the soft bed. I had millions of thoughts racing through my mind. It had to have been an hour before I finally fell asleep.

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**More of the characters you already know will come in soon :)**


	9. Chapter 9

**Alright, this one took me a long time to finish. But it's worth it, because it's pretty long :)**

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I walked along the beach, letting the waves wash up upon my bare feet. The wind blew through my hair and the sun warmed my face. It was so peaceful. I noticed birds far off in the distance, making this the perfect picture.

I heard a voice call my name. It was familiar in a sort of foreign way. I looked around for the person. When I turned, I saw the man behind me. He wasn't a stranger at all. The auburn hair and green eyes were a dead giveaway, but not as much as the bright smile that accompanied them. I hadn't seen that face since my last trip to Panem.

I ran to Finnick and threw my arms around him. It was amazing how much I had missed him. He appeared tall and handsome, and had definitely gotten older. But most importantly, he was safe.

Before I could say anything, though, I heard some sort of knocking in the distance. What was that? Suddenly my heart filled with dread as the picture in my dream melted away and I opened my eyes.

I slowly got out of bed and went to the door of my room. "Who is it?" I said quietly. My voice was still weak from sleep and I didn't know what time it was.

"Josh," my friend whispered back.

I opened the door and saw him standing there in clothes, wide awake. "What time is it?" I asked, rubbing my right eye.

"Early," he responded. "Can we talk for a minute?"

I let him in and shut the door. We both sat on my bed, which was a twisted mess because of how I had slept.

"Last night, Gale told me that the soonest we can go home is tomorrow," Josh said.

"Tomorrow?" I nearly exclaimed. He put his hand over my mouth- something that really could've become a habit by now- but I pushed it away. I brought my tone down again. "I didn't think it could be so soon."

"Neither did I. Tomorrow is a little optimistic, but he said we'll definitely be well enough within three days."

I looked at my hands in my lap. Three days? I could've gone a lifetime without having to explain things to the Hawthorne's. I missed my family, of course- but three days…. Here's the thing: I'm horrible with words. I can hardly say something accurately the first time, and when I try to correct myself, everyone just gets confused.

I looked up at Josh. "Will you help me tell them?"

"Why do you even need to ask me that?" He said. "Of course I'll help you. Even if I had nothing to do with getting us here, you're my best friend."

I smiled. "You really know how to keep things light, don't you?"

"It's the least I can do."

A few seconds passed before I sighed. "So do you think they'll help us?"

He seemed thoughtful. "Yeah. I mean, when it's an entire government against one criminal, how hard could it be to get back a time machine?"

"That's what I'm worried about," I said. "Gale might not mind helping us, but he may not be enough. And when we have an entire government helping us, don't you think they would do anything to get a look inside the machine?"

"There's a chance that you're right. But there are no more Hunger Games. Wouldn't that mean they're safe ?"

"I'm just not sure who we can trust here, Josh. Formend said he was able to get President Snow's diary. That could mean he was high in government status at one point."

Josh looked confused. "Formend?"

"You know; the guy who sort of dumped us in toxic chemicals? Does that ring a bell?"

"Oh… He didn't tell me his name."

"I don't know how much was in that diary, but he definitely knows that I've been here before," I thought aloud. "I wonder what his motive is. Why would he try to kill us? Just so he could use the time machine for himself? Has he already taken it into some other time period?" I felt my hands grow colder. "Are we trapped here?"

"That does make things a little harder to figure out," Josh said. "Did you ever consider the fact that if we go to the exact same place that Gale picked us up, we might be able to find Formend's hideout?"

"It's crossed my mind," I replied. "But he's too smart to just pick a spot in the middle of nowhere and build a gigantic building for torture. Chances are he's long gone by now."

"I guess you're right…"

Questions accumulated relentlessly in my brain. What did Formend want to do? Where was Philo taking us before he died? Would Gale determine what to do about our situation? Were we trapped here? Would our families simply have a funeral for each of us back home, without even knowing what happened? They all pounded me and it seemed as if noise was piercing my head. I put my hands over my face and sighed in exasperation. "Why does everything here have to be so complicated?!" I said. I'm surprised Josh didn't try to quiet me again after how loud my statement was.

I felt something rising in my throat. A sort of liquid seemed to dampen my eyes. No. I couldn't cry. I wouldn't. But obviously my emotions didn't get the message. I was unable to stop the tears that rolled down my face and fell into my lap.

"Haley," Josh said gently. That didn't really help. It just made me more frustrated with myself.

It was the first time I caught my mind wandering to the thought that I would never go home. I'd pondered that many times when I had gone into the 65th Hunger Games. Everything was so new and sudden then, and it was only natural that my mind went to the worst case scenario. But this time… I don't know. I probably assumed things would work out as smoothly as they had before. Evidently not.

I was no longer just letting tears fall from my eyes, but now felt short of breath. I inhaled sharply and triggered more tears. Everything felt hopeless.

Josh moved closer to me and put his arm around my back. I hated it when people saw me crying, but somehow I managed to stay near him. I rested my head on his shoulder- this was what you could call having a shoulder to cry on.

"Haley," he said, "You shouldn't worry about anything. This is my fault, and I'm going to get you home, no matter what it takes."

I tried to bring my hand up to my eyes, because he had just made more tears come out, but he held it away. I finally looked him in the eyes. "I promise," he continued. "I'll explain every detail to Gale today. I'll even go and get the time machine by myself if I have to. But you will go home; whether it's today, or in weeks."

"Josh…" I trailed off. I had to compose myself. Come on, Haley, you can do this… "You'll never know how glad I am to have you as a friend. But I'm not just going to sit around pretending I can't do anything to help. We'll both talk to Gale. We came here together and we're leaving together."

He half-smiled. "Just stay positive."

I felt like and absolute wreck. It seemed like Josh knew what he was doing more than I did, and I was the one who had been here before. Well, when I thought about it, I was kind of a weakling then, too. I could've been dead about three times if someone hadn't saved me. Had I cried at all during that trip? I nearly did when I said goodbye to Finnick. Maybe the fact that the time machine was much harder to find in a whole country instead of just an arena made me emotional.

I dried the remaining tears on my face. "So that's it? We're telling them today?" I asked.

"The sooner the better," Josh replied. It seemed like there was something he wanted to say, but couldn't bring himself to. He spoke slowly. "Have you ever thought that Formend might be the Heat villain that Gale told us about?"

"I've just naturally assumed that," I said. "I mean, he tortured us, and then Philo broke us out to ask us questions. That fits the description."

"But there has to be more to the story there," Josh went on. "He knew we were from the past. Why did he let us go? He knew that we wouldn't be able to answer questions about Panem, so what was the point in him letting Philo rescue us? Nobody is that stupid."

"That's what I've been asking myself all this time." A sudden thought invaded my mind. "Why do you think Gale hasn't asked us about Philo? Or Heat? He knew that we were prisoners of Formend, so why hasn't he asked us to lead him to the hideout?"

Josh understood what I was saying immediately. "That's a good question… Do you think he knows something that we don't?"

"He knows a lot of things that we don't; but there is something in particular that I think we need to find out."

My friend closed his eyes and breathed out slowly. "I can barely even wrap my mind around this whole thing."

"That's why paying attention to the details comes in handy," I replied. "Last time I came here, I wasn't really keeping track of anything. Now I'm used to remembering facts."

He smirked. "Alright then- what color shirt was I wearing yesterday?"

"Sky blue."

Josh raised his eyebrows. "Lucky guess…"

I laughed quietly. "Trust me on this one: you'll want to scrutinize everything."

"Well how am I supposed to remember what you're wearing, along with all of the other huge details that keep happening?"

"You don't need to remember what I'm wearing," I said, still humoring him a little. "Just try starting with major events."

He looked at the ceiling, as if that would help him with recollection. "Let's see…. We got here on a Friday. Within a few minutes, Formend's hovercraft thing picked us up. We were knocked out for who knows how long. I got dropped in the water and you…" His smirk came back. "Jumped in. I guess that's why your hair turned blonde."

"Not funny," I replied, even though I wanted to laugh. I glanced up at his hair. "And you're one to talk."

I noticed that his arm was still around me, so I moved away slightly to where he wasn't touching me anymore. We weren't in a desolate moment now, and I didn't really want it to get awkward.

"Hey, don't hate on my hair," he said, smiling. "At least I've never dyed it."

"That was one time!" I exclaimed as quietly as I could. He was referring to the time I was twelve and dyed mine at a party. I was grounded for innumerable weeks after that.

"_Anyway_, Philo broke us out and started leading us to 'his house'. Then the P.G.R.T. shot him and Gale lifted us up into their hovercraft by freezing us with those scary little devices on our arm."

"Those were scary," I said. "That's probably one of the most surreal things I've ever experienced."

"You mean besides time traveling into the future?" Josh asked sarcastically.

"Yeah, besides that."

"Ok, so after you got your cut treated and all that painful stuff, they shoved us into the hospital for… Five days?"

"Six."

"Wow, that long?" he said. I nodded and he continued, "Then we came to the Hawthorne house. This is our third day here."

I smiled. "Excellent. Now all that we really need to worry about is telling Gale today."

"I say we tell the whole family at once," he proposed. "They're all going to find out eventually, so we might as well make it less confusing and tell the story to all of them at once."

"I hope they side with us."

"I'm beyond hoping it. I'm depending on it."

I sighed. "Alright. Should we spill it this morning?"

"That's probably the easiest way." He patted my back in a supporting, friendly way. "If you don't want to explain, I'll be glad to."

"No way. We're doing this together."

* * *

Several hours later, the two of us bravely faced the Hawthorne family. Josh said we had something important to tell them, and they all assembled in the living room- Julia, Lucius, and Camilla all sat on the couch, Marcus leaned against a wall, and Gale sort of stood in place, ready for whatever we were about to throw at him.

Something I hadn't considered was how to start this confession. I couldn't start saying random facts about time machine building, or they would be lost. I looked at Josh, as if asking him to begin.

My friend cleared his throat and straightened his stance. "Before we say anything, I just want to make it clear that we have no intentions of holding you to anything. You've saved our lives, let us in to your house, and been more hospitable than anyone we've ever met."

Gale's eyes seemed to have the slightest bit of something in them. But what was it?

"We just…" Josh trailed off. He seemed a little ashamed. "We haven't been completely honest with you."

"About what?" Camilla asked.

"For starters, we're not from District 1," I said. "We're not even from Panem."

This is where a little more knowledge could've come in. By saying that we weren't from Panem, the family could've written me off as crazy. Because, the fact was, I wasn't even sure that the rest of the world existed anymore. Maybe Panem was the only livable place left.

Julia seemed confused, adding to my assumption that there were no other countries in the world. "Then… Where are you from?"

"North America," Josh said without hesitation.

It took everyone half a second for realization to enter their minds. Lucius was skeptical. "Oh really? And how is that?"

Oh no, now what would I say? "Uh… Has anyone here ever heard of time travel?" I asked, sounding ridiculous.

Gale and Camilla nodded. They must've been more connected with what the world used to be like. Or maybe the term just sounded familiar.

"Well, time travel was a fictional thing. It meant being able to go to different times in history. No one ever thought it was possible. But I became so obsessed that I started building a time machine to travel with. Does that make sense so far?"

Everyone nodded.

"Alright, so, with Josh's help, I built a time machine. Long story short… It worked. I was transported into the 65th Hunger Games."

"Hold on," Lucius interrupted. "You expect us to believe that? If something like that really was possible, the Capitol would've figured it out by now."

"Bear with us for a second," Josh said. "Anyway, Haley went into the Games and somehow returned to the machine and went back to the past alive. A year later in our time, I was being an idiot and decided to use the machine. When I came back from the future she was furious to say the least. We were kind of in an argument when I accidentally brought us here. The machine overheated, and Formend's hovercraft captured us. The hovercraft you were in rescued us, Gale. But… The time machine is still with Formend. We can't go home unless we have it."

Gale took it all in with serious eyes. He was completely unreadable. "Who's Formend?" He asked.

"Oh, well, that was what he told me to call him," I answered. "He wouldn't tell me his real name."

"And you didn't hear anyone call him Heat?" He questioned.

"Not once. But I'm naturally assuming that he is Heat. He tortured us, and Philo broke us out. That's what Heat does, right?"

"Yes. But I'm wondering why he needs your time machine. And I don't know why he let you go, since you know what he looks like." Gale crossed his arms. "You did see him, right?"

"Of course. And I've also been wondering why he let us go," I said. "Apparently he knew about my first trip to Panem."

"What does he look like?" He asked.

"He had bleached blonde hair that came down to his forehead. He was extremely tall and thin. He looked about thirty-five."

Lucius stood up and began to leave the room. "It's just a story, dad. They're probably another pair of spies that Heat sent out."

"We're not spies!" I said. "How can I prove that I'm from the past?"

He turned around and crossed his arms. "First of all, if you were from the past, you wouldn't know so much about us. Just because you went into an old arena doesn't make you an expert on Panem. So how do you know about most of the things from Julia's history book?"

I copied him and crossed my arms. "Because Panem is the country in a book called The Hunger Games. The book follows the events from the 74th Hunger Games up until the end of the rebellion. I don't know how the author of the book knew about all this, but nevertheless, I haven't found out that one fact in it was wrong." I turned to Gale. "You were practically Katniss Everdeen's best friend. Your mom is Hazelle, and your siblings are Rory, Vick, and Posy. Your father died in the same mine explosion that Katniss's did." My voice began to take on a sort of pleading tone. "Please. You have to believe us."

I started to regret some of the things I'd said. Gale didn't break in his firm appearance, but his eyes reflected a certain amount of pain. I'd just brought up his dead father and his former best friend. And who knows? Hazelle may have died at some point too. But thankfully he didn't look angry.

"How do you suggest we get your time machine back?" He asked.

"Well…. I'm not sure," I admitted. "To tell you the truth, I haven't exactly thought about that. I just know that Josh and I can't do it alone."

"Alright, I'll tell you what I'm going to do; I'll take you to the hospital today and get you tested, to see if the Magnopolium is completely gone. If it is, you can help me devise a plan. If not, you'll train with Julia, Marcus, and Lucius while I decide what to do next."

"That sounds fine to me," Josh said. "Will we be able to help attack Heat to get the machine back?"

"Maybe," Gale said. "It depends on how you two fare with weapons."

Well, I would probably do alright as long as I didn't have to kill anyone.

* * *

**Wow, that was a long chapter, haha. Anyway, I was wondering if anyone has suggestions for what my next story should be. Don't worry- this story isn't even close to being over. But I'm a little bit stuck on what to write next. I want it to be diverse and unusual (kind of like this one).**


	10. Chapter 10

Ok, so, given that my previous experience in the District 2 hospital wasn't that pleasant, I didn't exactly want to go back in. Even if it was just to be tested for Magnopolium. I could tell that Josh was just as reluctant, if not more.

I felt sort of bad for him. He had been putting all the blame for this on himself. I mean, yes, he did leave the machine on. But I was the one who argued with him the day we time traveled. And really, I built the time machine for the most part. He just helped with heavy objects and such.

Anyway, Gale led us into a large waiting room. Let me tell you something; whoever designed the hospital was not focused on happy atmospheres. Everything was a stunningly pristine white color, the floor was hard, the chairs were metal, and the room echoed. I'm sure they weren't deliberately trying to make the place intimidating… At least I think they weren't.

Josh and I sat down in the uncomfortable chairs. I had assumed that Gale would stay with us. Evidently not. Almost immediately a man in the distinctive P.G.R.T. uniform tapped him on the shoulder and whispered something in his ear.

"I'll be back after your examination is over. The nurses will know what to do," Gale said. And with that, he walked away beside his co-worker.

When no one was looking, Josh leaned over to me and spoke with his voice low. "Does he seem a little different to you?"

"Definitely," I replied. "It's because we told him the truth."

"You don't think he holds anything against us, do you?"

I sighed. "I hope not. But chances are that he might not treat us normally now. It's like the time I was in the arena. For quite a while, Finnick acted like I was some sort of confused and ignorant person. I mean, why would anyone even try to leave their own time period? It wasn't until we found the time machine that he started to treat me like I was real."

"So… Is that just your gentle way of telling me that _I'm _a confused and ignorant person?" Josh asked, smiling slightly.

I laughed. "No, not at all! You know that I would never say that to you."

"But you don't think it, do you?"

"Of course not. You're one of the smartest people I know. You just didn't have all of your facts straight when you wanted to time travel… Sort of like me last year."

A low female voice called out, "Haley Green?"

I looked up at the counter. A woman with glossy black hair pulled tightly into a bun had her attention on me. I stood up and looked at Josh briefly. "I'll be back."

He nodded, and I went over to the nurse. She led me down the hall connected to the waiting room and through a door marked "examination room".

Isn't that just the scariest title you've ever heard?

I sat in another uncomfortable chair and was left in the room alone. I held out my hand in front of me and saw that it was shaking. I felt fine, didn't I? I hadn't felt the stinging of Magnopolium, I hadn't smelled it… Wouldn't that mean I was alright?

Then again, there are very many deadly things you can't smell.

The door flew open swiftly and a middle aged doctor came through with a clipboard in his hands. Somehow I'd imagined him exactly the way he appeared. Of course, I'd probably thought of him as slightly more evil looking.

"You must've gotten into some trouble if you have Magnopolium in you," he said, finally looking up from the clipboard.

"It's pretty hard to explain," I managed to reply. "But I don't feel toxic anymore- so does that mean I can go?"

Thankfully, he didn't tell me to suck it up or be brave. "Well, what I was planning was a test on your skin, and if that was clean, I would check your blood."

"Would you test my skin with that liquid that sort of burns?" I asked. He nodded, and I continued, "Couldn't you just go straight to the blood test?"

He put on latex gloves and began sorting through a drawer. "I suppose. But if the poison level is high, I will have to check your skin afterwards." He must've found what he was looking for in the drawer, because he picked it up. I still wasn't able to see what it was. He nodded toward the wall. "Read that list. Sometimes Magnopolium affects vision."

"Alright, uh…" I squinted to see the words on the poster. Did I need glasses or something? "'Nightlock, Glendrol, Magnopolium, Phyilinthrac, Taydolion…" I felt a needle pierce the skin on the back of my arm. I gasped in unpleasant surprise.

"It's less painful when you don't think about it," the doctor said, carefully pulling the needle out. "That's why I told you to read."

I felt slightly deceived, but I would have to get over it. "What do those words on the list mean?"

"It's a list of the deadliest poisons known," he said.

"I thought Nightlock was a berry?"

"It is. But we've heard that some unsuspecting people drank juice from the berries. Nightlock and Glendrol are the only two things that are more dangerous than Magnopolium."

I wondered how many deadly poisons there were in Panem.

* * *

Six hours later, I was sitting on the couch in the Hawthorne's living room. Camilla had just gotten off the phone with the doctor, who informed us that the Magnopolium would be completely gone the day after tomorrow.

Julia, Marcus, and Josh were also in the room with me. Julia and Marcus were eager to start training us with the ax and sword, and I noticed that Josh even looked a little excited to learn. But I wasn't exactly. Because if I knew how to use a sword, then people would expect me to fight. And if I could fight, I was expected to kill.

What person in their right mind truly wants to kill someone? Take away confusion or anger, and what do you have left? Just another person. That sounds reasonable… Doesn't it?

"Lucius and Septimia said they'd meet us out in the field soon," Julia said, standing up and stretching her arms. "We'd better get going if we're supposed to walk a mile. It's my dad's strict orders that Lucius watches us every second we're training."

"That makes sense," Josh reasoned. "I mean, swords aren't the most kid-friendly thing in the world."

Julia laughed and began leading us out their back door. "I can't wait to see how you can throw, Josh. You look like the type who could get some extreme power behind the ax."

"I played football up until last year," he said. "In the middle of the season I broke my hand and was out for a long time. When tryouts came around again, I realized I didn't really have a desire to play anymore."

While the two of them walked by each other and discussed Josh's hobbies, I stayed a little further back with Marcus. He gained my focus by saying my name. "Haley?"

"What?" I realized I'd been off in my own world for a moment. "Oh, yes Marcus?"

"Would it be too much to ask about North America?" He asked. "I'm curious to know what everyday life is like there."

"That's no trouble," I said. "Everyday life… Is kind of like everyday life around here. We have school that's probably a lot like yours. I don't think we're as close to our families though. Don't get me wrong, I love my family very much- it's just that we seem to spend a lot more time around our friends than people here do." I felt a little guilty. My circumstances probably sounded so easy and carefree to him, and yet I took my life for granted many times.

"Do you miss it?" He asked.

"Very much," I replied. "Of course, it's fascinating to come here and meet all of these people who I thought were just characters in books. But my family is one of the most important things I have."

He smiled. "It's strange to think of my dad as a character in a book."

"You wouldn't believe some of the things fan-fiction writers come up with though," I said. "Because to them, he is just a character, so they change a lot of things- starting with your mom. It never said that he married someone in the books, but it's implied. I think your mom is the best interpretation of his wife that I've ever seen."

"Uh… Ok…"

I obviously didn't make much sense to him. "Oh, sorry if I'm confusing you- I do that to a lot of people. And I get my words mixed up, and also sometimes stutter. Then I'll start to babble on about something when I get nervous. It's also really bad when-"

Marcus cut me off with a laugh. "You aren't nervous around me, are you? You barely stopped to breathe while you were talking."

"No, you don't make me nervous," I said. "Sorry. Maybe I'm just nervous about training… Or training with you."

"You don't have to be nervous," he replied. "I'll be easy on you while you're starting out. Besides, Lucius will be watching to make sure we're safe."

The fact is that Marcus _was_ what made me nervous. But why? He wasn't dangerous in the least bit. Was I scared that he might reject me now that he knew where I was from?

"So Haley," Julia suddenly said, "Have you ever played sports or had any physical training?"

"Not really," I admitted. "I'm the reading type- not the sporty type."

"That's not true, Haley," Josh said. "You can outrun me."

Well, I guess this was true. In the past year I'd devoted more of my time to P.E. and could now run faster than him. That didn't mean he wasn't still superior to me at sports though.

"But that won't make a difference in sword fighting," I said.

"Yes it does," Marcus said. "Even if you're horrible with a sword, running can be a good fallback. You never know what you'll have to face."

For the rest of the way, all I heard was small talk between Josh and Julia. They seemed to be getting along fairly well. I would hate to break it to Josh that he would never see her again once we found the machine…

I realized that we were now in a field with a line of trees nearby. The grass had the same characteristics of everything else I'd seen in District 2; it was dry, brittle, and rough. But it would have to work. I mean, it was better than falling on rocky ground. The trees looked like your average evergreens.

Within minutes we were approaching Lucius and Septimia. I immediately noticed how pretty Septimia was, with her wintery blue eyes and flowing blonde hair. Lucius stood beside a large black case with wheels on it.

"Are you all ready to get started?" He said, unlatching the case and lifting it open. Inside were many weapons, all decorated in black and with a small logo stamped on them in some way.

"As ready as we'll ever be," I said.

Lucius smirked and handed Marcus two swords (one was bigger than the other). "You two practice away from here. Don't do anything potentially dangerous until I come over to watch you."

Marcus and I did as we were told and stood a fair distance away from the others. He handed me the smaller sword. "This one will be easier to start with."

"Thanks," I replied, observing the rather plain handle and extremely sharp blade.

"Now, the first thing you need to know is how to block," he explained. "If you're fighting someone and only know how to attack, chances are you'll be dead in seconds." Marcus held up his sword for me to see and pointed at two obscure buttons. "Hold these down and pull the blade off your sword. Be careful not to cut yourself."

Maybe that was why the handle looked so plain. I did as instructed and the blade on my sword came away with a single pull. Underneath was a metal baton that was the length of the sword, but had rounded edges, making it safer. "Wouldn't it be easy for this to come off in a fight?" I asked.

"It's designed so that you can't accidentally push both buttons at once." He carefully took both of the blades and set them down away from us. "Even if you did, merely swinging the sword wouldn't make it fly off." He picked up his baton. "Now, try to hit me."

I was a little stunned. "But you haven't even taught me anything yet."

"Don't worry; I'm just giving an example. I won't swing back. Just try your best to catch me off guard."

I gripped the baton and immediately tried to hit him in the arm. It actually surprised me at how quickly he deflected my attack. Our metal weapons rang when they connected, and mine sent a slightly painful shock into my hand. It's not like I was about to complain though. Besides, the padding I held probably took most of the blow.

"Try something a little more creative," Marcus said, sounding as if he wanted me to hit him. So I quickly aimed for his shins and was once again met with the sound of metal and a sharp feeling in my hand. He was better than I thought.

He smiled a little. "You have potential."

"How long have you been this good?" I asked, only slightly breathless.

"I wouldn't know," he said in an amused tone. "The only people I ever get to fight are some of my dad's friends from the P.G.R.T. My mom is the only one in my family who I could duel with, but she doesn't like using weapons unless she absolutely has to."

"Well, I'm pretty sure you'll be a good teacher."

"I'll try my best."


End file.
